It's a big tree, but you barely notice it. All winter, you take it for granted. Then spring comes, and the tree is covered in dark pink cherry blossom. Ignore me now, it seems to say. Overlook this, if you can. It fills the tiny garden in which it is growing, as dominant as it is delicate.
Cherry trees are the conceptual artists of the botanical world. Christo wrapped the Pont Neuf in gold fabric. Eliasson installed a convincing artificial sun in the Tate Modern's turbine hall. The effect of a cherry tree in sudden and abundant bloom is similarly arresting. Overnight, the drabbest suburban streets are transformed by these magnificent flowering trees, which are magically at odds with their setting, and so beautiful as to be almost absurd. No wonder the Japanese celebrate them, hold picnics beneath their branches and forecast the arrival of the blossom, like weather, as waves of pink and white flowers progress northwards through the country.
There is beauty in a single blossom, a lone tree, or in a row of trees – a cherry orchard. Their effect and aesthetic can vary depending on the colour of the blossom – from white through to deepest pink – and on the shape of the tree, with the weeping cherry being particularly lovely. For all its famous delicacy, there can be something robust about the sheer depth and quantity of blossom, the weight and abundance of flowers.
And at the heart of it all is transience. It will last a week, this spectacle, no more than that. The gutters on the streets will be full of pink petals and the branches will be bare again. The petals will decay and the trees themselves will become unremarkable and will once more be taken for granted. And the trees themselves will no longer be so evident to us. All things must pass. Enjoy it while it lasts.
